Special sessions: How often and how long?

Monday's special session of the Legislature, lasting just four hours, was among the shorter special sessions but is far from alone in brevity.

According to a Star Tribune analysis of information from the Minnesota Legislative Reference Library, 20 of the state's 50 special sessions lasted just one day. Of those, six, like the Monday special session, were designed to forward state money for disaster relief.

See the graphic below for a look at all the Legislature's special sessions. The larger the circle, the longer the session. You can click on each circle to find out more details about the reason and time the Legislature came back to St. Paul.

Although various politicians repeat various estimates for the per day cost of the special sessions, past payments indicate that a one-day special session costs between $30,000 and $40,000 for per diem and travel.

A Duluth native who just barely lost Virginia's GOP gubernatorial primary said that politicians have not gone far enough in condemning the left for violence during a rally of white nationalists in Charlottesville. "I think that the left is going to try to use this as an excuse to crack down on conservative free speech," said Corey Stewart. "I think they're going to try to use this as an excuse to remove more historical monuments."